Society and the World

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Our meddling intellect

One impulse from a vernal wood

What, you are stepping westward?

For old, unhappy, far-off things,

And now I see with eye serene

Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide;

In common things that round us lie

The statue stood

A reasoning, self-sufficing thing,

Once did she hold the gorgeous East in fee,

Plain living and high thinking are no more:

Plain living and high thinking are no more:

Milton! thou shouldst be living at this hour:

And much it grieved my heart to think

The still, sad music of humanity,

On that best portion of a good man’s life,

We must be free or die, who speak the tongue

We must be free or die, who speak the tongue

Earth has not anything to show more fair:

Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;

The scratching of pimples on the body of the bootboy at Claridges.

Women have served all these centuries as looking-glasses possessing the magic and delicious power of reflecting the figure of a man at twice its natural size.

This is an important book, the critic assumes, because it deals with war. This is an insignificant book because it deals with the feelings of women in a drawing-room.